generalspeaking

Sudan: From Islamist Military Regime to Military Rule

"What has been just stated is for us a coup, and it is not acceptable."
"Our request for a civilian transitional government has been ignored."
Sara Abdelgalil, spokeswoman, Sudanese Professionals' Association

"He's like the spider at the centre of the web -- he could pick up on the smallest tremor, then deftly use his personalized political retail skills to manage the politics of the army."
"Most of them [provincial leaders and tribal chiefs] became militarized and enmeshed in one of the popular defence forces. He has that extraordinary network, and it's all in his head."
Alex de Waal, professor, Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tufts University

Omar al-Bashir has been in power since 1989   Reuters

It is far, far from justice, but at the very least perhaps a start in turning Sudan around from its dread ill repute as a nation whose ruler stifled dissent through a scorched earth policy. It seems, on the evidence, a very Arab response to a public outcry against a regime's ill treatment of its minority population, or a majority population ruled by a minority-representative administration -- with the previous examples of Rwanda and Syria, unrivalled in their massive butchery.

Former Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir was responsible for a horrendous slaughter in Darfur when black Darfurians protested their inferior status at the hands of its Arab rulers. Al-Bashir set out to slit the collective throats of Darfur's largely farming community beset and disadvantaged by the preferential treatment of Arab herders -- and in that revolt and its aftermath an estimated 300,000 Darfurians were killed, 2.7 made homeless, and mass rapes perpetrated.

Al-Bashir not only used helicopter gunships to unmercifully shoot down fleeing Darfurians hoping to find refuge in the forests, he bombed them, and urged and armed the mounted Arab militias known as the Janjaweed to pursue, torment and slaughter the Darfurians. When the International Criminal Court named him for genocide and declared him a fugitive from justice, no other Arab regime had the slightest interest in handing him over to the ICC.

The 75-year-old dictator prided himself on his humble beginnings born into a farming family. He had no iota of compassion for the remote villages and farming communities he destroyed in Darfur. He joined the military as a paratroop commander and in 1989 was leader of a coup to take the country from its elected prime minister, in a country accustomed to military takeovers. Leading an Islamist regime intent on embedding shariah law, international jihadis converged on Sudan, Osama bin Laden among them.

The vast country of Sudan was divided among Muslims, Animists and Christians in the south, where a war raged in a battle for independence. Sudan had become one of those wealthy, oil-rich nations enabled to fund modernization of its urban areas, and that enabled al-Bashir to cultivate a culture of one-man-rule exemplified by their president's personality cult; cue Saddam's Iraq, Moammar Gaddafi in Libya, Hosni Mubarak's Egypt and Bashir al-Assad's Syria.

When Christian South Sudan gained its independence in 2011 and split off from Sudan its geographic split included most of Sudan's oil riches. Suddenly Sudan became poor again and Khartoum was under pressure. Gradually the economy of Sudan faltered and went into free-fall, an inflation rate of 72 percent, scarce fuel, and living standards collapsing, raising the ire of the urban middle classes leading to a revolt.

The initial protest against rising bread prices spread like wildfire from one town to cities across Sudan, protests led by doctors and other professionals. The protests continued and they swelled, just as they did in Egypt when Mubarak was brought down and the Muslim Brotherhood moved on their opportunity to bring an Islamist to the presidency in Mohammed Morsi. Neither the civil conflict nor the atrocities in Darfur with their enormous loss of life moved Sudanese to revolt; the price of bread did.

Sudanese demonstrators cheer as they drive towards a military vehicle

Sudan's top military man, General Awad ibn Ouf, named de facto leader faced the wrath of the demonstrators demanding a transition to democracy under a civilian body. He was forced to make way for another military man, one with no involvement in savage brutality; the former announcement had Sudanese celebrating, the latter had them sputtering with rage, claiming that military rule was simply extending the regime of Omar al-Bashir.

A military tribunal, it was stated, would hold al-Bashir to account for crimes he committed; no doubt the other two Sudanese military elites under al-Bashir's rule indicted by the ICC -- the interior and defence minister and the senior security chief -- will sit on that tribunal as senior military figures. It was emphasized, however, that Sudan is not prepared to hand over their former president for trial into war crimes and crimes against humanity to the ICC; it would humiliate Sudan.

"Revolutionaries, we will continue our path", chant tens of thousands of people rallying in front of military headquarters in protest over the military power takeover, making a travesty of justice of the removal of the former president. "Just fall, that is all!" the crowds chanted, oblivious to the gunfire being exchanged by rival gangs of soldiers.

Sudanese protesters gather near the military headquarters in Khartoum as they continue to rally demanding a civilian body to lead the transition to democracy one day after a military council took control of the country, on April 12, 2019.

Labels: Coup, Darfur, International Criminal Court, Militarization, Sudan

posted by Pieface @ Saturday, April 13, 2019

The New Militarization of Japan

ARTICLE 9. (1) Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes.
(2) In order to accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained. The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized.
Japanese Constitution

A mushroom cloud over the city of Hiroshima, taken on a reconnaissance plane that flew with US air force bomber Enola Gay that dropped the atomic bomb.   Source:News Corp Australia

The very thought of Japan militarizing their country again, after the colossal suffering caused by its entry into World War II by bombing Pearl Harbour and aligning itself with the Axis covenant of Nazi Germany, would have been unthinkable a decade ago. At that time the presence of military installations in Tokyo were unacknowledged. Military personnel serving at the headquarters of Japan's Defence Department couldn't show themselves in military uniform in public. Travelling from their homes to the military bases they would wear civilian garb, changing into their military uniforms once arrived at base.

Japanese civilians had suffered so intensely, the U.S. atomic attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki had been so horrific in the vast scope of their destruction, let alone the constant aerial fire bombings carried out by the Allies against Japanese cities and towns so complete in their unsparing ruination of the country the very thought of a Japanese military for offensive purposes was utterly unacceptable to the Japanese. The presence of a preventive, defensive military was conceivable but nothing more.

That has changed. Japan has no deficit in military hardware and highly advanced technical equipment, all labelled defensive, despite their clearly offensive capabilities. The Constitution of Japan, however, is clear, that Japan will refrain from ever maintaining an offensive capability. So the ideal writ in law and the reality seen in actual practise fail to align. And the reason for that is hardly a surprise. North Korea having sent medium-range ballistic missiles into the Sea of Japan could have resulted in a response.

That is, had it not been for one monumental deterrence. That North Korea is under the protective aegis of China. Relations between Japan and China are strained and at times volatile. Militant Japan's occupation of an unprepared and docile China in 1937 and Japanese brutalities and mass atrocities will never be forgiven by the Chinese. That Japan no longer exists, and nor does that China. The China now dominating the global scene is a confident, strong and influential China dominating the east militarily and the west financially.

Chinese nationalism is alive and well and continues to grow with each bellicose claim of ownership of the South and East China Seas. China has created artificial islands to host airbases, anti-aircraft missiles and the Chinese "coast guard" vessels patrolling areas China claims are its own, despite that they are areas disputed with its neighbours. China's declaration that even airspace is theirs and that permission is required to fly over said airspace has been challenged by U.S. fighter jets overflying "China's airspace".

Japan has built itself a responsive military machine. It has 18 diesel electric submarines, four helicopter destroyers (aircraft carriers), 43 destroyers and destroyer escorts, 25 minesweepers and training ships, fleet oilers, submarine rescue ships and its navy, the Maritime Self-Defence Force is the second-largest in Asia, one of the largest in the world, highly advanced technologically, growing continually. Japan is adding to its two 27,000-ton Izumo-class helicopter destroyers along with advanced U.S.-style Aegis class destroyers able to shoot down medium-range ballistic missiles.

The 8,200-ton, 170-meter--long destroyers are equipped with the Aegis Baseline J7 combat system. (Courtesy of the Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force)

These are all defensive, of course, because Japan's post-Second World War Constitution's Article 9 prohibits it from any offensive military capacity. Japan had the wherewithal to build what it has thanks to its economic status as the world's second-largest economy. A status it has fairly recently surrendered to China. But Japan's remains a highly technically advanced economy as the world well knows, where quality control in production is king.

Heavily dependent on sea transport, as a maritime nation Japan relies on the incoming transport of fuel oil and natural gas from the Middle East through the Strait of Malacca and the Formosa Strait. As a former protectorate-in-practise of the powerful United States of America, Japan could always depend on the back-up of the U.S. to protect its interests. Much has changed in that relationship since the Obama and Trump administrations, though the bonds remain firm.

The Trump White House, however, no longer guarantees its Sheriff role to its collegial nation-partners. With China clearly in the ascendancy in the region, South Korea, Japan, Australia and others dependent on the constancy of the United States to ride to their rescue has diminished and those nations must now look to themselves being fully responsible for their own defence. As the world turns.

Labels: China, Conflict, Defence, Japan, Militarization, Military, Offence

posted by Pieface @ Saturday, November 10, 2018